Congregationalism

Congregationalism is a denomination of Protestant Christianity which originated during the 1620s and 1630s in the Puritan movement of New England in what is now the United States. Congregationalists are a part of the Calvinist tradition, and they have a congregational form of church government in which members of the congregation are elected to leadership positions within the church. Congregationalism heavily influenced the development of democracy in the United States, and it shaped both mainline and evangelical Protestantism in the United States as well as Unitarianism and Unitarian Universalism. During the 20th century, Congregationalists fractured into several factions.